6 Signs It’s Time to Hire Additional Staff

6 Signs It's Time to Hire Additional Staff

As a business owner or manager, you’re keen to keep costs down, and that means you’ve been running pretty lean in the staffing department. But if you’re at the end of your rope and swamped, it may be time to go ahead and hire more people to help relieve the workload of you and your team.

Here are 6 warning signs that you need to hire more help right this instant!

1. Your Employees are Jumping Ship

They’ve been complaining that they’re overworked, but you thought that was just your typical teenage employees. Now they’re quitting, attributing the workload to their reasons for leaving. You’re left holding the bag with even more work than before.

If you care about your staff (or even simply don’t like having to go through the hiring process), be proactive and hire more help before the staff you’ve already trained walks out.

2. It’s Your Peak Season

For many businesses, summer drives 5x the business through their doors than any other time of year. So why wouldn’t you increase your staffing? You simply can’t accommodate a flood of new customers with your skeleton crew from the winter.

3. Your Customers are Leaving. Angry.

When you don’t have enough staff to properly handle customers, customers leave. And that’s the last thing you want. Consider how much money you’re losing just to save a few measly bucks on staffing. It might even be putting you in the hole. But adding new employees, on the other hand, can help you increase sales. More money = good thing.

4. You’ve Got More Profit Than Usual

Sure, everyone loves profit, but it’s time to look at your business and figure out what you need to reinvest in. I’m guessing it’s your employees.

5. You’re Working More Than Usual

If you’re taking on more shifts at your ice cream shop/hotel/restaurant than usual, that’s probably a good indicator that you need help. After all, your time is not best spent serving customers. It’s doing admin. Taking inventory. Paying bills. Marketing. Your time is worth more than your hourly staff’s, so hire to cover your shifts and get back to your office.

6. You’re Constantly Stressed

If you haven’t pinpointed the cause, take a good look at your staff. Are they stressed too? When there’s more work than people can handle, that stress spreads like a wildfire. Just think of how you could put out that fire and make for friendlier work relations simply by bringing on a few new pairs of hands.

In the long run, you won’t save money if you don’t have adequate staff to run your business. In fact, you’ll probably lose money. Be proactive and try to hire before you really need new employees so you have time to train them.